small moon · moon of the dwarf planet Pluto
Kerberos
A tiny moon of Pluto found by Hubble in 2011, orbiting between Nix and Hydra; New Horizons saw it as a small, bright, double-lobed body.
- Distance from Earth today
- 5.35 billion km35.77 AU · light: 4 h 57 min
- Distance from the Sun today
- 5.33 billion km35.64 AU
- As of
- 4 November 2026position from NASA/JPL orbital elements
Where it is today
Top view of the plane of Earth’s orbit, compressed distance scale. Open on the big map with the time slider →
Facts
- Diameter
- 12.0 km
- Mean distance from the planet
- 58,300 km
- Orbital period
- 32.2 days
- Orbital eccentricity
- 0.010
- Orbital inclination
- 0.4°
Source of the figures: JPL SSD – Planetary Satellites (public domain).
Discovery: 2011 – Mark R. Showalter et al. (Hubble Space Telescope)
Description
Kerberos was the fourth moon of Pluto to be discovered, spotted in 2011 in Hubble Space Telescope images by a team led by Mark Showalter while searching the system for hazards ahead of the New Horizons flyby. It circles the Pluto–Charon pair between the orbits of Nix and Hydra, about 58,000 km from Pluto, once every 32 days. New Horizons imaged it in 2015 from a distance and revealed a small body with two lobes and a bright, icy surface – brighter and smaller than astronomers had expected. Its name is the Greek spelling of Cerberus, the three-headed dog guarding the underworld, chosen to avoid confusion with an asteroid already named Cerberus.